One of the core activities of CIANT is a laboratory, a space for interdisciplinary exchanges and collaborations between visual, sound and performance artists on one side, and computer scientists and interaction designers on the other.

The main axes of research interest are:

Networked performances

We are interested in distributed artistic performances. Thanks to broadband Internet we are experimenting with remote participation of several artists at different locations in one single performance piece. Together with partners such as IRCAM from Paris, France, CIANT team is testing characteristics of new platforms for networked performances.

Motion capture systemsy

Many of the laboratory experiments have been recently focused on integration of real and virtual performers between real and virtual stages. In this respect we have been developing and using advanced tools for real-time interaction between a moving performer on real stage and moving agents as well as objects in virtual space.

Computer games technologies

During the last two years there were several cutting-edge interactive installations in domain of computer games modifications produced at CIANT laboratory. Computer games are a global popular culture phenomenon. The underlying technologies that have been created and put in place by teams of thousands of developers represent today the most advanced marriage between immersion and interactivity. When it comes to art, radical concepts can drive human-computer interaction design and can be developed in rather unexpected creative ways while misusing commercial products and/or scientific interfaces.

3D visualizations

Virtual reality (VR) and 3D visualization in general is considered very attractive domain for new media artists. However, making and presenting static 3D scenes can not satisfy their creative demands. Nowadays, new media artists strive for tools that would enable them to create highly interactive VR and mixed reality installations that can be experienced among number of participants, possibly physically spread. The interactivity is supposed to be supported by atypical and specific input devices, tightly connected with new media installations. CIANT research lab works on Human–computer interaction digital tools since a decade and has been working in the fields of online virtual environments, real time multimedia processing and device management.

We have recently developed and optimized several techniques and tools that allow for fast prototyping of 3D reconstructions and providing them with an advanced level of interactivity. The resulting interactive visualizations are often displayed using custom made stereoscopic projection system to allow for as immersive individual experience as possible.

Digital archives and open platforms

Issues of archiving digital content have been of our growing research interest in the last couple of years. Beginning with a successful OASIS project (Open Archiving System with Internet Sharing) that interconnected content holders of historical video art collections across Europe, now developing the idea of wide access to multimedia art online further within the GAMA project (Gateway to Media Art), CIANT laboratory has become one of the leading cultural organizations that deals with issues of metadata and the overall strategies for archiving digital artistic content. We are currently facing some of the ontological foundations for archiving also in the framework of a large-scale research project CASPAR (Cultural, Artistic and Scientific knowledge for Preservation, Access and Retrieval) that looks at digital archives in a pioneering future-oriented perspective of OAIS reference model application.